Joseph: Finding Purpose in Feast or FamineSample

Accepting the Gift with the Challenge

When I wrote my first novel, I did it with the intention of publishing that single book. At the time, I had no idea my six-month illness would become chronic conditions that limited my stamina and make writing more practical. Six years later, I attended a writer’s conference with a very rough draft and received an invitation to send one editor my full manuscript. “You’ve got some craft issues,” she said, “but I think you can tell a story. Learn a lot while you’re in that fiction mentoring course and send me your best work.” It wasn’t a glowing invitation, but since I didn’t even know what POV (point-of-view) was, I believed God was at work on my behalf. It turns out He was, and that same editor offered me a two-book contract! They wanted the second book written immediately and submitted within twelve months, planning to publish the novel I’d already written two years later.

Of course I accepted but was utterly panicked. The novel I’d proposed to them had taken me twelve years to write! It started as a Bible study, then morphed to hybrid fiction/non-fiction, then emerged in its final novel form. I had no idea how to write a novel from start to finish—and definitely NOT in only a year! However, I assumed if God had somehow secured a contract for me when I knew almost nothing about writing fiction, surely He could teach me to write a novel in twelve months.

I wonder if Joseph felt some of those same feelings when Pharaoh gave him the overwhelmingly grand news that he was not only freed from his unjust imprisonment but would also now be the second-most powerful man in Egypt. “Oh, by the way,” says Pharaoh, “it’s your sole responsibility to get the whole nation—the whole world—through the next fourteen years of feast and famine. And another ‘by the way,’ you’ll marry a pagan priest’s daughter because I said so.” Have you ever considered the political nightmare Joseph would have faced as a thirty-year-old ex-con Hebrew vizier, commanding governors in every nome of Egypt to submit to his authority? I don’t care how fine his robe was or how shiny Pharaoh’s signet ring looked on his finger. Even with a new Egyptian name, Zaphenath-Paneah had an uphill battle to climb!

Yet hadn’t God given him the interpretation for Pharaoh’s dreams and the words to provide the solution for the next fourteen years? Wouldn’t that same God give him the favor his father and Potiphar had shown him? Wouldn’t Elohim be with him as He’d been in prison? Couldn’t Joseph show God’s steadfast love to a wife who had only known false gods? God waited to give Joseph this position until his life experience built enough faith to match the task.

What hardships and challenges have come with your most recent blessings? Can’t a Giver powerful enough to give such gifts empower you for the challenges ahead?